


You made me happier

by BlackWolf105



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: F/F, Fluff, Sort of Character Study of the Whole Team, Team Dynamics, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-12-07 20:55:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18240077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackWolf105/pseuds/BlackWolf105
Summary: Bear keeps bringing home stray animals from his walks.John enables him, Fusco thinks its funny, Root loves cats, and Shaw decidedly does not.Harold doesn't really know what to make of it, but he supposes he can learn to live.





	You made me happier

**Author's Note:**

> Title from You Could be Happy by Snow Patrol, if you haven't heard it, I recommend.
> 
> This started off as a conversation between a friend of mine and me about Bear slowly collecting a team of his own, where all of the animals he brings back represent one of the team, and it turned into... whatever this is.  
> Anyway, shout out to SylviaNightshade, who is the wonderful Root to my Shaw :)  
> Kudos and Comments are always appreciated.  
> Enjoy.

Harold Finch let out a sigh as he studied his computer screen, leaning back in his chair as – for the first time in what felt like days – he allowed his eyes to drift shut.

It was rather amazing how quiet the subway station became he was alone; there was no tapping of Ms. Groves’ nails across her keyboard, or of Bear’s across the ancient stone floor, no incessant muttering from Detective Fusco or the metallic ring of guns being pulled apart again and again by Ms. Shaw, and most noticeable of all was the absence of Mr. Reese’s silent presence.

It simply was, and Harold knew that any moment his team – his friends and family – would come barging in with rumbles of laughter and loud exclamations, and so he leaned back, eyes closed, and simply treasured the quiet while he could.

And soon enough, he heard the sound of quiet footsteps barely echoing down the ancient tunnel, accompanied by the click-click-click of nails across the stone, and he knew that it must be Mr. Reese returning from his walk with Bear.

With a sigh, he opened his eyes and returned to his duties at the computer.

After a moment or two, he heard his companions enter the main room.

“Evening, Harold.” Harold could picture John’s reserved nod as he inevitably bent down to release Bear from his leash.

“Mr. Reese.”

From behind him, Harold then heard a sound he was quite sure he’d never heard from within the subway before: a rather loud… squawking sound, like some sort of bird.

Hands leaving his keyboard, he spun his chair around, and was greeting by quite a sight.

John was standing beside Bear, face carefully neutral as he stared back at Harold, but what really caught the older man’s attention was his dog, who was sitting proudly at John’s side with what appeared to be a relatively large bird in his jaws.

Harold blinked. “Is that-”

“A crow?” John glanced down at the dog, who turned to face him, causing the bird what appeared to be extreme stress. “Yeah. He found it during our walk. It looks as though its wing is hurt; it can’t really fly. He just picked it up, and I couldn’t get him to let go.”

“So you let him bring it _here_?” John shrugged at Harold’s incredulous tone.

“Like I said, he wouldn’t let it go, so I figured why not.”

“Why not? Perhaps, Mr. Reese, because it’s a wild animal?”

At that, Bear finally let the distressed bird go, dropping his jaws enough that the animal half fell, half floated to the ground below before letting out a shriek and flying rather unsteadily to the top of the subway cart, where it perched, glaring at the occupants of the room.

“Wonderful.” Harold let out another sigh, staring at the bird as it ruffled its feathers.

“Think of it this way, Finch, now we won’t have a rat problem anymore.”

Harold leveled his gaze at John as the other man struggled to stifle his smile, while Bear simply sat beside him, tail moving swiftly across the floor.

***

“Finch.” Harold jumped slightly as Ms. Shaw’s voice broke his train of thoughts, and he turned to find her standing directly beside him. “Is there a reason that there’s a bird sitting on the subway car?”

Harold sighed, glancing up at the bird for a moment before turning his gaze back to his work, “Bear brought it home after his walk last night.”

“And it’s here _because_?”

“Because I can’t find a way to convince it to come down long enough to trap it and bring it back outside. So, for the time being, it seems as though it will be living here.”

She looked incredulously at him, “You do know the number of diseases that birds can carry, right?”

“Which is precisely why Ms. Groves has elected you to ensure that it’s disease free, for the protection of both us, and Bear.”

The woman looked at him for a moment, “I was a doctor, not a goddamn vet.”

Harold shrugged, returning to his work.

Shaw muttered something under her breath as she moved away from him, glaring once again at the bird with a vague look of distrust, before sighing.

“Well, at least we won’t have a rat problem.”

***

“I think he looks like an Edgar. You know, like that Edgar Allan Poe story.” Harold closed his eyes for what felt like the eleventh time that morning.

For the last two hours, Mr. Reese, Ms. Groves, and Detective Fusco had been debating what to call the crow that was apparently permanently living within their headquarters.

“I’m surprised you know who that is, Lionel.” Harold spun his chair around in time to see the detective shoot Root a glare.

“You do realize that I probably have more formal education that you, right?”

“You do realize that the poem is called ‘The Raven’, right?”

Before the petty argument could turn into something more, John interrupted. “Edgar.” He gazed thoughtfully up at the bird, which gazed back down at him for a moment, before tucking it’s head under it’s wing. “I like that.”

The other two nodded their agreement, everyone looking up at the creature while Harold simply watched his friends.

Fusco smirked. “See, told you it was a good name.”

Root rolled her eyes in annoyance, but Harold couldn’t help noticing the hint of a smile gracing the woman’s features as she turned her attention back to her computer, black nails tic-tic-ticking across the keyboard.

***

After a while, Harold barely noticed the presence of the bird – Edgar, as the others, with the exception of Ms. Shaw, insisted on calling it.

At this point, it was a part of the ever present noise of the ancient hideaway; nails and claws, muttering and laughing, talking and cawing.

Occasionally, Mr. Reese or Ms. Groves would return from helping a number with scraps of food for him, and Harold had found that the subway now, in fact, had a decrease in the number of mice.

 It simply was, and Harold found that, after a while, it was easier to tolerate than he had originally thought.

***

“Oh my God.” Harold started at Ms. Groves’ exclamation, turning to her, expecting to find her engrossed within the code, but instead he found that she was looking backwards, towards the door to the subway. “Is that a kitten?”

Harold too turned towards the doorway, experiencing a moment of déjà vu as he saw John leading Bear into the subway, except, where before he’d held a bird in his jaws, he now held what was indeed a small kitten.

Harold blinked as Bear who, once released from his leash, trotted proudly over to the pair, sitting down in front of Harold, the small cat dangling from his teeth.

Immediately, Root leaned forward and, with minimal effort, convinced him to release his prize.

The kitten was quite small, fitting easily within Ms. Groves cupped palms. Its coat was rather short, and made up of white, black, and orange-brown spots, and its eyes were coffee brown, wide and curious as it meowed and nudged at Root’s fingers with its nose.

The woman let out a small laugh as its tiny pink tongue darted out, scrapping against the tip of her finger.

Harold just looked up at John, who stared right back.

“He found her under a dumpster.”

“And you, _again_ , let him bring it here?” John shrugged.

“Well, this time I brought her to a vet first.”

Harold closed his eyes for a second, before releasing his breath and turning to Ms. Groves, intent on instructing her to bring the kitten to the nearest shelter.

However, when he opened his eyes to find her sitting with the kitten held in her hands as it rubbed its head against her chin with a contented purring sound, Root’s fingers running softly through it’s fur, he felt the words die in his throat.

With a sigh, he shook his head and turned back to his computer, knowing full well that there was no way Root would be finishing her portion of the code for a while yet.

He supposed that, for Root, he could get used to another animal in his space.

***

“Root, get your goddamned cat away from me.” Harold paused in his research as he heard Shaw’s outburst.

Turning, he found her seated at the bench, half assembled semi-automatic in her lap as she glared down at the kitten which was currently attempting to chew on her shoelace.

Mr. Reese and Detective Fusco were currently on a stakeout, leaving Harold and the two women alone in the subway, and for the last half hour, the kitten – now named Zero – had been trying to creep up on Ms. Shaw, much to the woman’s disapproval and Ms. Groves’ amusement.

Consistently, whenever it thought Shaw wasn’t paying attention, the kitten would lay low, belly to the floor, and slowly but steadily creep forward until it was close enough to grab at her shoe laces. And consistently, whenever Shaw noticed the steady approach, she would yank her foot away with a glare that sent the small kitten scampering backwards, only to repeat it’s endeavor.

“Come on, Sweetie, she likes you.”

“Yeah, well, I _don’t_ like it.”

From what Harold could tell, the kitten – for some reason – really did like Ms. Shaw, despite the latter’s attempt to avoid the creature at all costs. Whenever she was in the room, the kitten would gravitate towards her, always playing a game of how close she could get until Shaw noticed and chased her away.

With a roll of her eyes, Root swooped in and scooped the kitten off the floor, cradling it in one arm as she sat down next to Shaw, her free hand draping against the back of the bench, fingers tangling in the hair falling from Shaw’s ponytail, head tilting slightly and voice low.

“That’s what you said when you first met me, now look at us.”

Harold turned back to his computer, feeling as though he were intruding on something he wasn’t meant to see, despite knowing that the two women knew he was there.

As he went back to studying the life and financials of their latest number, he let himself get lost in the simple silence.

“Root, if that thing tries to crawl into my lap one more time, I’m gonna feed it to the bird.”

***

Before long, Harold accepted the latest addition to his life. He became used to entering the subway in the morning to the black gaze of the bird above the subway door, the pleasant familiar bark from Bear, and now the tiny mewling noise from the kitten as she attempted to pounce on his shoelaces every time he took a step.

He became used to, after a long day of working at the computer, turning around to see the bird sleeping quietly atop the car, Bear curled up in his bed, eyes open and tail wagging quietly so as not to disturb the tiny body sleeping on his back.

***

“Are you kidding me?” Harold looked up from his book at Ms. Shaw’s incredulous voice.

She was staring at John and Bear, who had once again returned from their daily walk, and at first he couldn’t figure out exactly what it was that had caught her attention, until he got closer and could see the tiny black body clinging to Bear’s back.

Shaw looked at John as the tiny creature’s dark eyes glared up at everyone present. “ _Another_ cat?”

John shrugged, still not looking sheepish despite the fact that this was the third stray animal that he and Bear brought home with them. “It was snowing, and she was in a cardboard box outside of a gas station. We couldn’t just leave her.”

Root appeared beside Shaw, Zero not far behind.

Upon seeing the other kitten, she immediately let out a squeal and reached forward, but where Zero had gladly allowed Root to hold her, it appeared to Harold as though this new kitten was not so receptive to her advances.

The moment Root’s hand got close enough, the kitten hissed, swiping a paw out and lightly scratching Root’s hand, although failing to do anything more than create light pink lines on her fair skin.

Root let out a quiet laugh as the cat jumped from Bear’s back, the dog letting out a confused whimper, before darting away, disappearing behind the stacks of Ms. Shaw’s trunks and crates piled against the wall.

Grinning, Root looked up at the others.

“I like her.”

***

“Sameen, Sweetie, look!” Limping into the subway, Harold was greeted by the sight of Ms. Groves kneeling on the floor, cradling the tiny black kitten in her hands, eyes bright with excitement.

Ever since the small kitten – which was small enough to fit comfortably in the palm of a hand – had entered the subway, Root had made it her mission to get the cat to like her, despite its proclivity to bite and scratch at anything that got close.

The kitten wasn’t really big enough to do a lot of damage to Ms. Groves, although on an occasion or two, it had broken skin. For the most part however, Root would happily sit on the floor whenever she could, trying to coax the kitten out of whatever hiding place it had found, enduring the small scratches and pinprick bites until the kitten simply gave up and allowed the woman to pet her.

After a while, the kitten had begrudgingly allowed Root to pick her up, although, hold her for too long and she would start to squirm, uneasy with remaining trapped, wanting to wander.

Harold watched as Shaw walked over. “What am I supposed to be seeing here?”

Root grinned up at her, “She’s asleep.”

Shaw blinked. “So?”

“So, I got her to trust me.”

***

Harold had hoped that Gidget – Root had claimed naming the second kitten as well as the first – would be the last addition to his life, but that dream was dashed when John returned from yet _another_ walk with Bear, this time with a rather aesthetically challenged bulldog at his heels.

His only excuse was, “He looked sad.”

***

After the bulldog – which Ms. Shaw had so aptly named Donut, due to his tendency to eat them unless they were kept as far away from him as possible at all times – Harold was rather surprised, but glad nonetheless, that no more strays appeared with Bear upon his return from walks, and eventually, Harold got used to the small zoo living in their headquarters.

The bird still spent most of his time perched atop the subway car – although occasionally Harold noticed that he would fly down and sit in the dog bed with Bear – while Zero would spend most of her time trying to sneak up on Gidget who – like Shaw – was having none of it.

Bear would occasionally play with the small kittens, allowing them to chase his tail as he swept it back and forth across the floor, and making sure the two – although mostly Zero – didn’t fall off onto the train tracks in their haste. More than once, Harold had witnessed Bear knocking one of the two backwards away from the platform with a paw if they got to close.

Donut mostly just sat around and watched everything unfold, tongue hanging out of his mouth.

***

He wasn’t the only one who was getting used to their new companions either; Ms. Shaw had immediately taken to Donut – Harold suspected that she was always more of a dog person – and he often entered the station to find her wrestling with him and Bear.

But after a while, he noticed that she started paying a little more attention to the cats as well.

She didn’t glare at Zero every time the kitten tried to attack her shoes, or slink into her lap from Root’s while the two woman sat side by side, and gradually, Zero seemed to realize this as well, becoming bolder as she tried to attract the woman’s attention, graduating from slowly creeping forward to attack shoelaces, to simply trying to jump from whatever object she’d climbed onto Shaw.

Gidget still didn’t necessarily _trust_ Shaw, in fact, Harold was fairly sure that the only person Gidget actually liked was Root, and even that was tenuous at best. However, the two seemed to have an understanding, whereby both parties left the other alone, unless Root somehow forced them together.

***

Root was always most attached to the kittens, spending every possible moment playing with Zero, or trying to gain Gidget’s trust. Zero followed Root everywhere, and while Gidget still tried to bite or claw at her occasionally, Root had somehow convinced the smaller kitten to remain still long enough to be cuddled occasionally, before inevitably with a swift bite to her fingers, the kitten would leap from her hands, and scamper off to hide somewhere alone.

***

Fusco gave them all nicknames.

Donut became Butterballs, due to the bulldog’s clumsiness and tendency to trip.

Gidget was Fidget, since the kitten seemed to vibrate with energy, never able to sit still, always wanting to be in the middle of the action, or hidden away somewhere.

Zero was Boomerang, since anytime Root was in the vicinity, the tiny kitten would return to her side like a much smaller, more furry shadow.

Edgar was Wingman, for obvious reasons – or at least that was what Fusco had said, Harold didn’t see the connection, but he supposed that perhaps it didn’t matter.

***

John aided Bear in his efforts to protect the smaller kittens, keeping them from falling onto the tracks or getting stuck underneath or behind the endless equipment stacked and hidden around the room.

***

Harold simply sat to the side, always watching but never joining in, his calm quiet stare mirrored from atop the subway car.


End file.
